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William Baker (Earth-616)
Real Name: William Baker Nicknames: None Former Aliases: Sylvester Mann, Quarryman Other Current Aliases: Flint Marko Status Occupation: Professional Criminal Legal Status: Citizen of the United States with a criminal record Identity: Secret; Known to the authorities Marital Status: Divorced Group Affiliation: Former member of the Sinister Twelve, the Sinister Six, the Frightful Four, the Outlaws, Intruders and the Wild Pack; Former reserve member of the Avengers Base of Operations: Mobile Origin Place of Birth: Queens, New York Known Relatives: Mrs. Baker (Mother), unnamed cousin First Appearance: Amazing Spider-Man #4 History William Baker was born and raised in a rough neighborhood of New York City. His father walked out when he was 3 years old, leaving him and his mother impoverished. Baker learned to steal at an early age, and cheated and bluffed his way through school. He excelled at football, but ruined his chances for a college career when he accepted money to throw an important game. Baker was found out and expelled. After landing steady work as a henchman for a gang that ran protection rackets, Baker adopted the name Flint Marko. Marko became a successful denizen of the New York City underworld, but entertained thoughts of reforming to marry his girlfriend, Marcy Conroy. Arrested for a series of crimes, he was convicted and spent several years in solitary confinement. During that span, Marko grew increasingly hostile. Upon his release, he discovered that Conroy had left him for another member of his gang, Vic Rollins. After exacting brutal revenge on Rollins, Marko embarked on a one-man crime spree. Eventually, he was captured and imprisoned in the maximum-security ward at Ryker's Island. Cutting short his stay, he escaped through an unguarded drainpipe, the knowledge of which he had purchased while in confinement. Marko headed south to start a new life; he was pursued by the FBI, as well as state and local police. Narrowly evading the law on numerous occasions, he made his way down the East Coast. Marko sought refuge at a nuclear test site near Savannah, Georgia. He was lying on a nearby beach when an experimental reactor's steam system exploded, bombarding him with a massive dose of radiation. After a short period of unconsciousness, Marko awoke to find that he could transform his body into an animated, sand-like substance. Now able to elude the authorities with ease, Marko embarked on a criminal career that brought him into conflict with Spider-Man, New York's friendly neighborhood wall-crawler; the Fantastic Four, the greatest team of super-powered adventurers ever assembled; the Hulk, green-skinned engine of mass destruction; and a number of other costumed champions. The Sandman later teamed with the scientifically empowered Wizard, the paste-tossing Trapster and the then-bewildered Medusa -- a member of the royal family of the Inhumans, a genetic offshoot of mankind. As a member of the Frightful Four, Marko battled the Fantastic Four countless times. He also acted independently, most often coming into conflict with Spider-Man. The Sandman's criminal career crumbled when he joined forces with Hydro-Man, who could transform his body into animated water. In a freak mishap, the Sandman and Hydro-Man combined to form a grotesque, mud-like monster. The authorities subdued the creature, rendering it harmless, and its remains were transported to the police forensic laboratory in Manhattan. There, scientists sought to analyze the composition of the unusual mud, but determined with the instruments at their disposal that it was inanimate. They decided to seal the substance in a container and dispose of it. Apparently as a delayed effect of the analytic procedures, the mud spontaneously separated into the two criminals, who burst free of their container. The ordeal so traumatized the Sandman that he decided to reform, using his powers for mankind's benefit. Though there was a period of speculation among the general populace as to whether his intentions were sincere, he gained the public's trust and joined the Wild Pack, an international team of mercenaries. The Sandman even became a probationary member of the Avengers, Earth's Mightiest Heroes. After he helped the Avengers defeat the sorceress Morgan LeFay, Baker again became the man he had grown to despise: Flint Marko. The Wizard brainwashed the Sandman into believing he had faked his well-intentioned heroics. It was first learned that the Sandman's mind had been tampered with following his attack on the life of the mysterious Senator Stewart Ward. The Sandman then joined the Sinister Six -- a team of villains also consisting of the tentacled terror Dr. Octopus; the high-flying, lowdown Vulture; the master illusionist Mysterio; Kraven the Hunter; and the extraterrestrial-human hybrid Venom. After Venom's teammates humiliated him in battle, he set out to take revenge on each of them. During a heated clash, the alien symbiote bit off a chunk of the Sandman's mass. As a result, the Sandman began to lose bits of himself until he eventually dissipated. Apparently delirious from his condition, he sought out Spider-Man to exact his final vengeance. Try as he might, he was unable to muster the strength to overcome the wall-crawler. The despondent Sandman then lost cohesion and was washed away into a New York City storm drain. Sandman's body and mind scattered with the grains of sand. The major part of his mind merges with the beach and begins swallowing people in an attempt to piece himself back together. Spider-Man tries to free the captured people from Sandman's beach consciousness, which is his evil mindset, and succeeds when Marko explodes from too many clashing mindsets. Soon the sand of the beach begins to spread to different areas around New York, and all of the different aspects of Sandman's shattered mind form individual beings - Marko's good side, evil side, feminine side and childlike side. Spider-Man locates all of the different versions of Sandman and attempts to convince them to return to one being. Sandman's evil side merges with his child and feminine sides, but Sandman's good side doesn't want to allow evil to become a part of him again. The new Sandman responds by abandoning his good side completely, which eventually crumbles into lifeless sand and blows away. While the new Sandman is not the sadistic monstrosity that his purely evil side was, he is a criminal and seems to lack any desire to become a hero or do good. Sandman is one of the villains recruited to recover the Identity Disc, but is seemingly killed due to mutinous behaviour. At the series' end, Sandman is revealed to be alive and working along with the Vulture to manipulate the other villains. Characteristics Height: 6' 1" Weight: 240 lbs Eyes: Brown Hair: Brown Powers Strength Level: 85 tons Known Powers: The Sandman possesses the ability to convert all or part of his body into a sand-like substance by mental command. His brain has attained subliminal awareness of all granulated particles of his body. Through conscious effort, he can affect the degree of molecular cohesion between the numerous adjoining surfaces of his particles and thus cause locomotion of discrete volumes, down to the individual grains. His radically mutagenically altered body composition and increased density enable him to compact or loosen the particles of sand that make up his form. Consequently, the Sandman can become as hard as sandstone, or disperse his body so that he becomes invulnerable to physical attacks. He can shape his sand-state body into any continuous shape he can imagine. He can project his sand particles outward at high speeds and, when in the shape of a bulky object, with the impact of a large sandbag. The Sandman is vulnerable to heat: temperatures of 3,400 degrees Fahrenheit can cause his highly impure silicate composition to fuse into amorphous silicate (glass). The Sandman maintains mental control of the particles of which his body is composed so that he can reform his scattered grains unless a substantial portion of his body mass has been isolated. Apparently, he can also convert common grains of sand around him into constituents of his body to replenish portions he might lose track of during battle. In this manner, he can increase his overall size and volume (to some as yet unknown limit), or that of his limbs. There appears to be no limit to how long the Sandman can remain in his sand-state. If he were to be rendered unconscious while in his sand-state, he would remain in that state, although the relaxing of his control over his particles would cause him to become an amorphous pile of sand. The Sandman's mind continues to function in astral form even when he has turned his head into sand and even when the particles of sand that composed his brain are widely scattered. The limit to how far the particles of his brain can be dispersed before he is unable to reassemble is not yet known. Abilities: No known abilities. Weapons: No known weapons. Paraphernalia: The Sandman briefly used a suit that he created with Reed Richards' stolen equipment, that he used to mix chemicals with his sand to create new affects. Some of the chemicals could make his sand into a slippery puddle, a sandstorm, solidify him to a brick-like form, adhere him to vertical walls, and coat him with a substance that would turn into a poisonous powder when heated by the Human Torch's flame. Notes * William Baker/Flint Marko, the Sandman, will be portrayed by Thomas Haden Church in the upcoming movie, Spider-Man 3. He seems to obtain his powers from jumping into some sort of giant nuclear whisk after an attempt at escaping the law that seems to tear him apart and transform his body into sand. From recent photos, it seems that the Sandman is somehow involved with the murder of Uncle Ben, as he is seen with Michael Papajohn, the actor that portrays the car-jacker that kills Uncle Ben, from the first film. Trivia * Recommended Readings *Amazing Spider-Man #4 - First Appearance and Origin. *Amazing Spider-Man Annual #1 - Battled Spider-Man as a member of the Sinister Six. Complete List Related Articles * See Also * Character Gallery Sandman (William Baker) External Links * References * ---- Category:Characters Category:Living Characters Category:Male Characters Category:Bad Characters Category:Divorced Characters Category:Secret Identity Category:Brown Eyes Category:Brown Hair Category:Silver Age Category:Sinister Six members Category:Sinister Twelve members Category:Frightful Four members Category:Intruders members Category:Spider-Man villains Category:Copy Edit